AAUW Work Smart Salary Negotiation Trainings Now Available Across the U.S.

On this Equal Pay Day cities are not waiting on the sidelines

WASHINGTON — The AAUW Work Smart salary negotiation program that helps women hammer away at the gender wage gap will have greater reach this Equal Pay Day, due in large part to frustration with the status quo. Left on its own, the gender wage gap won’t close for another 135 years, which is unacceptable and explains why numerous cities are collaborating with AAUW.

AAUW Work Smart has expanded beyond Boston, where it first launched just two years ago, to Washington, D.C.; Tempe, Arizona; and Long Beach, California. Additional collaborations are underway and should be announced after Equal Pay Day, which this year falls on April 4. It’s the symbolic date when women’s earnings finally catch up to men’s earnings from the previous year. Effective salary negotiation is one factor among many that can help close the gender pay gap.

“AAUW is firing on all cylinders to close the wage gap. We are working to get better legislation, we are engaging corporations, and we are teaching women how to negotiate with confidence,” said Abigail Lewis, AAUW Vice President of Leadership Programs and Campus Initiatives. “We need to throw everything we can at this problem because if we continue with the status quo, the wage gap won’t close until the year 2152.”

“It is completely insulting that a woman can lose hundreds of thousands of dollars over the course of her career because she is paid less than her male coworkers,” said Kate Black, director of the Washington, D.C., chapter of the Younger Women’s Task Force that is collaborating on an AAUW Work Smart initiative. “We must ask for more.”

AAUW Work Smart is unique because it’s one of the largest efforts of its kind and free for participants. In the two-hour workshops, participants gain the tools and practice they need to negotiate for what they’re worth. The workshops also incorporate research from AAUW’s well-known report The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap, which is now available in Spanish.

To learn more about AAUW Work Smart and AAUW Start Smart salary negotiation workshops for college women, e-mail salary@aauw.org. To find a training near you, visit salary.aauw.org.

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AAUW empowers women and girls through advocacy, education, philanthropy, and research. Our nonpartisan, nonprofit organization has more than 170,000 members and supporters across the United States. Since AAUW’s founding in 1881, our members have examined and taken positions on the fundamental issues of the day — educational, social, economic, and political. Learn more and join us at www.aauw.org.